On a recent Friday morning, a crowd gathered at Cronemiller Lake in Peavy Arboretum near Corvallis to watch students from four universities scamper up an elevated pole of wood and saw the end off with a chainsaw.
The event was called “Obstacle Pole,” and it was part of the Spring Thaw, a series logging sports events that formed a competition hosted by the Oregon State University Department of Forestry Logging Sports team.
Along with OSU, participating schools at the 2026 edition of Spring Thaw were Montana State University, the University of Idaho and the University of British Columbia…